Adults in Gaston and Lincoln counties, North Carolina, can now get help with an Opioid Use Disorder. That holds even when they have no insurance or money for treatment. The support comes through the Gaston-Lincoln Medication Assisted Recovery Services (MARS) Project, announced in Gastonia on September 28, 2018. Anyone 18 or older qualifies if they meet those terms.
Partners Behavioral Health Management received the funding from the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). The award is the Targeted Capacity Expansion: Medication Assisted Treatment – Prescription Drug and Opioid Addiction grant. It is worth $1.6 million and will cover full recovery services for 160 people over three years.
This is the third major SAMHSA grant Partners has won in a year. It is also the only LME/MCO in North Carolina to receive SAMHSA money for medication assisted recovery. State leaders have noticed, too. In August, Governor Cooper held a roundtable at the Partners office in Hickory. He came to hear from its experts and local leaders about their community-based approach to the crisis.
How the MARS project will work
Barbara Hallisey, the project administrator and Partners’ Associate Clinical Services Director, said the epidemic has hit both counties very hard. Because each county also has serious gaps in services, she said, the grant is meant to fill them.
Instead of leaving low-income adults without options, the project gives those who want to recover access to evidence-based care. It has two main goals. First, it aims to increase the use of medication in recovery. Second, it seeks to reduce opioid misuse. Medication will come with therapy, peer support and other psychosocial help, since that mix supports whole-health recovery.
Integrated Care of Greater Hickory will treat patients in Lincolnton. Meanwhile, McLeod Center will serve people through its Opioid Treatment Programs in Gastonia and Hickory. In addition, researchers from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte will study and evaluate the grant’s results. Providers expect to start admitting patients by January 2019.
The project also adds to the medication assisted treatment already offered in the eight Partners counties. That care is paid for with local, state and federal money.
Partners is a local managed care organization, or LME/MCO, serving central and western North Carolina. It gives the region’s most vulnerable residents access to care. It manages all Medicaid, state and local funding for intellectual and developmental disability, mental health and substance use services. The organization serves Burke, Catawba, Cleveland, Gaston, Iredell, Lincoln, Surry and Yadkin counties. Its community offices are in Gastonia, Hickory and Elkin.
